lbr

My wife and I visited Botswana in Nov of 2007 and had a great time at the Lebala, Lagoon, and Footsteps camps.
I posted a trip report with photos on my website:
http://www.silentkids.com/travel/botswana.shtml

We planned the trip thanks to help from this message board.
LBR.

sniktawk

That has got to be the most professional trip report I have ever seen, thank you. Great Photos!

I have to say that I think you were extremely lucky in your sightings in particular the Wild Dog.

We will be in Lebala and Lagoon in two weeks, and hope to see as much as you did.

HariS

Thanks, LBR ...... nice photos and great luck with the Lagoon pack of dog!

lbr

Thanks for the comments!
Sniktawk I hope you have luck seeing the dogs at Lagoon and Lebala as they were the highlight of the trip for me.
If you can get Steve and A.T. as your tracker and driver at Lagoon you will not be disappointed as they were by far the most enthusiastic of the guides we had.

cary999

Thanks lbr, great report and fun to read. I really like your format and especially using white letters on gray background. Very easy on the eyes to read. Thanks again.

regards - tom

HariS

LBR,

I asked you this question on the other thread...... but, which Steve? Big Steve i.e., Steve K?

who were your guides at Lebala and Little Kwara?

Thanks
Hari

Dana_M

Great trip report LBR. You had some great sightings. I'm a sucker for the dogs, so those were my favorite photos, especially the teeth shot! I looked your Trinidad/Tabago and Galapagos trips as well. Great reports and photos on all. Thank you.

Dana

P.S. Like your music too!

raelond

Wonderful trip report and photos! How did you find November in terms of the heat? I visited Botswana in June and was told by our guide that if we came back we should visit in November. Is November still high season?

sniktawk

lbr

Thanks for that, we hope to renew our acquaintance with the dogs, especially to see how many pups have survived since we saw them in July. I have some pictures of them on my website if you would like to take a look
www.sniktawkwild.com

Like Hari, we are most interested to find out if it was Steve k who was your guide, we have not seen him since 2005.

lisa

Very nice trip report, great to see Lebala & Lagoon again -- we were there in January 2007 and saw the dogs as well. Very special. Thanks for sharing your report and pics.

lbr

Thanks again for all the comments. Sniktawk, loved the wild dog pup photos you took!

Here are the answers to some of the questions:

At Lebala our guides were Donald and the tracker was Moeti. I don’t think Donald usually works at Lebala, he was subbing for someone. He really delivered on finding the leopard on the other side of the reserve for us.

At Lagoon, our guide was Steve, but not Steve K as I’ve seen the photo of him on the Kwando website.
I never caught our Steve’s last name but he was younger, maybe early 30's or late 20's. We really liked him because he volunteered to take us on the late night drive and was very enthusiastic about the wildlife and his job in general. He made sure we left before the other vehicles did. The tracker A.T. was quite good too. They were by far the best guides during our trip.

At Footsteps our guide/tracker was Alberto, he did a great job on our wildlife walks explaining how to read the animal tracks and spoors.

At Kwara our guide was Mothusi and our tracker was John. Mothusi seemed to always be late getting started and was my least favorite guide. He did know the wildlife well though.

We were there in late November and it did get very hot in the midday but I'm from the Southern United States so it was no worse than our summers. The temp for the drives in the morning were fine, the beginning of some of the afternoon drives were a bit hot until the sun went down. Keep in mind the cars are uncovered so you will need sunscreen and a hat. At night it got a bit chilly. Sleeping at night the temp was fine in our tent.

November is the shoulder season as the rainy period was about to begin. It did rain a bit towards the end of our trip and it was overcast on many days.

We reserved a private car at Lebala and Lagoon and really enjoyed being able to decide where to go without having to defer to other people in the car. At Kwara we had a shared car and one of the other guests had no interest in seeing wild dogs after the first day, so we missed a few other times we could have seen them. That’s fair, but I would have loved to see the wild dogs on every day we were there since they are my favorite predator.
If you can afford it, the private car is the way to go.

You don’t see much about it on these message boards but I really liked Footsteps camp. After a week of no exercise from riding in a safari vehicle all day, it was nice to be able to get some long walks in. Seeing the wildlife on foot brought an entirely new perspective to the experience.

LBR

atravelynn

Thanks for the Footsteps info.

I hope you received some compensation from your agent for not booking your internal flights.

You hit the wild dog jackpot and the 1st picture of them at the lagoon is wonderful. You even got to see a successful hunt! Then to find them on foot! The jackpot indeed.

That oddly shaped African Hoopoe is my favorite African bird.

Nice job on seeing the roan. Your owl pics are outstanding--both day and night.

Lovely photos from a wonderful trip.

PacoAhedo

Excellent trip report and very nice pictures,LBR.

I really enjoy and had lots of memories of my visit with my wife to some of those camps at the beginning of november.

We where not as lucky with the dogs at Kwara.They where there the day prior our arrival,then move to the adjacent concession and in our fourth and last day, we found fresh tracks again but did not have time to find them.

It is curious how the wound in "Hurt boy"´s face almost heal in a few days.
Take a look at the picture i took of him November 11 and you can see the difference.
Our guide told us he was hurt at a big fight with other lions and his brother was kill in that same fight?

I agree with Tom as far as the excellent format of your report.



Thanks for sharing.

Paco.

http://www.pbase.com/africawild/image/90341465

HariS

LBR,

Sounds like Steve M from your description - usually guides from Little Kwara. Sorry for the confusion - it originiated with the mention of Steve K on the other thread!

Mothusi - sorry you had mixed results. I had some brilliant guiding by him at Lagoon/Lebala, including a drive that began at 5Am and ended at 3PM (a transfer from L to L that had some magic at the end of the transfer). John, he's one of our favourite trackers .....
don't know the other guide you have mentioned, though......

Rgds
Hari

lbr

PacoAhedo, It was interesting to see your photos of the male lion we nicknamed "Hurtboy". That cut on his face had healed when we saw him but he had a nasty gash on his back leg from another fight. We realized on this trip that male lions really have a hard short life. Hopefully he will be able to find a territory to claim as his own one day.

HariS, thanks for the clarification on our mystery guide at Lagoon, it sounds like it was indeed Steve M as I think he mentioned he usually works out of Little Kwara.